October 23, 2012

Petulant, Perturbed Obama Just Can’t Help Himself

By Selwyn Duke

As with the vice-presidential debate and Joe Biden, Barack
Obama’s attitude in Monday night’s debate spoke more clearly than anything he
said. No, he didn’t laugh like Bozo the Clown, giggle like a schoolgirl, shake
his head, and roll his eyes like Jokin’ Joe did. But he looked petulant, perturbed,
and on edge (and was occasionally rude) throughout much of the night, despite three
days of debate preparation at Camp David. It seems Barack Obama just can’t help
himself.

It wasn’t that he was under withering attack by Mitt Romney.
In fact, I was struck by how Romney opened the debate with general statements
as to what our overall approach to the Mideast should be as opposed to hitting
Barack Obama on where he’s weak on foreign policy (everywhere). Romney could
have mentioned the president’s contradictions on Benghazi, something with which
Obama probably feared he’d be confronted. Romney could have said, powerfully
and in no uncertain terms, “Under Jimmy Carter in 1979, there was an Islamic
revolution in Iran, which has led to many of the Mideast problems we have
today; now, under Barack Obama, radical Islam is on the rise from Egypt to Mali
to Libya to Yemen. And now some in Egypt, like the government of Iran, want
nuclear weapons.” But it seemed that, for good or for ill, Romney’s strategy was
to appear presidential, impress upon the viewer that he possessed knowledge in
foreign policy, and then whenever possible connect America’s foreign fortunes
and influence with her economic health. Nonetheless, most likely due to a
tactical decision to be aggressive, Obama often acted like a man under assault.
Perhaps this was because he felt as if he should
be.

And that is the point. There were no big gotcha
moments in the debate, but Romney looked presidential where Obama at times
seemed small, largely because the president has a record to not run on. And no
amount of running on at the mouth can change that.

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Petulant, Perturbed Obama Just Can’t Help Himself

By Selwyn Duke

As with the vice-presidential debate and Joe Biden, Barack
Obama’s attitude in Monday night’s debate spoke more clearly than anything he
said. No, he didn’t laugh like Bozo the Clown, giggle like a schoolgirl, shake
his head, and roll his eyes like Jokin’ Joe did. But he looked petulant, perturbed,
and on edge (and was occasionally rude) throughout much of the night, despite three
days of debate preparation at Camp David. It seems Barack Obama just can’t help
himself.